Rollin Home Alone

Welcome back to the second edition of the Suicide Watch Songs Blog. It is dedicated to songs that one listens to when at their lowest. There are many subgenres within this large group, and with these first few posts I hope to show examples of as many of these as possible. "Sea Anemone," the subject of the first blog post, falls into a genre I like to call 'The Pit,' which is reserved for the deepest, darkest, nothing left in the tank kind of songs. Today's selection falls into the 'apathetic' genre. These songs exude a hopelessness like no other. Nothing the protagonist does can change their situation. Here you are, lost and the loser once again. This weeks selection is Jason Lytle's "Rollin' Home Alone."

"Rollin' Home Alone" by Jason Lytle, from Your's Truly, The Commuter



Note: This song is not 8:51 long, only 4:15. The video has 4:35 of silence at the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWUTMF_ArUs


Grandaddy is one of my favorite bands. Unfortunately I only started to get into them after they already come through Detroit for the last time. Sure, I was lucky enough that an EP and LP were still to be released, but I never got a chance to see the band live. It is my understanding that Lytle broke up the band because the band was getting bigger, there were more expectations and obligations, and it wore on his creative spirit and became an unhealthy environment for him. Afterwards, Lytle moved to Montana. While I was certain he would continue to make music, I was deathly afraid that one of my favorite musicians would never release anything to the public again. I was absolutely thrilled when I found out he was releasing a solo album only a few years later. I waited until his Detroit date opening up for Nico Case to purchase Lytle's solo debut, Yours Truly, The Commuter. I figured this would be a good way to check out the new material as well as hoping that he would get some more money than usual by buying direct.

There were two songs that made me tear up at that concert, one of which was "Rollin' Home Alone." It is one of those songs with few lyrics that repeat with small changes to augment the story. Again, while interpreting every lyric is not the aim of this blog, there are so few that my options are to dissect the entire thing or not at all. That being said, lets dig in.

"Rollin' home alone, here we go again, as if it's not alright, as if I need a friend." The second time through last couplet changes to "As if I even care, I might as well pretend." The tone of the verses come off in a slight sarcasm that truly sets up the hopeless feel of the song. One really gets the idea that this has happened many times before and the character is self aware enough to know he is headed down the same path as always and once again without recourse.

The chorus is what really gets me. "But I bought you something nice, yeah I got you something warm, for when the weather turns, when will I ever learn." "For when," becomes "And then," in the second chorus. The character tried his hardest. I got you a gift, not only a nice gift, but a thoughtful gift. It is getting cold out, and I bought you something warm. When will I ever learn...
Unrequited love is so hard because one has the hardest time realizing that it really has nothing to do with them. There is no way to make someone love you.

Musically there are many great things about this track. First off, a colleague of mine put it best when he said that Jason Lytle sings in such a way that any song could be reviewed for Suicide Watch. Lytle's voice is so beautiful, high and so fragile that it feels like turning the volume up too high might break it. The song certainly has the texture of a Jason Lytle song. It is driven by a rhythm section of acoustic guitar, bass, and drums, with synth and mellotron intertwining. My favorite part of the entire song is after the first chorus a guitar feedback loop builds out of the last chord and continues through the interlude, which chordally consists of a verse and chorus. This loop clashes with the verse chords and then resolves perfectly with the chorus chords. The tension and release of this is just amazing.

Now we come to the the concept that I think is the most interesting and most important about this blog. Lytle's record label, Anti, has a video up on their Youtube page in which Lytle speaks about the meanings of the songs on the record. He states that "Rollin' Home Alone" is about "... just feelin free. I don't know, either not having a girlfriend anymore, or not having a girlfriend, or just not really, not really caring, either way, and just skateboarding, drifting, rolling down the street; rolling home alone." The songwriter himself not only has a different view of the song, he has an almost completely opposite view. This goes to show that every piece of art is completely open to the full range of interpretation, and furthermore amplifies the idea that once a person creates something and submits it to anyone other than themselves it is no longer theirs, it belongs to everyone.

This brings to conclusion the second edition of The Suicide Watch Songs Blog. As always I encourage discussion and suggestions. Feel free to comment or email me at suicidesongs@communistdaycarecenter.net. Next time we'll explore the genre I call "Devil May Care." Thanks for reading.